:(

What a week. My burnout has finally topped out, and I had to make an all-stop on work for 10kB for a while so I can recover my sanity. Trust me - if you have no burning desire to write a book involving lots of words, an unfinished system, and other people, FOR GOD'S SAKE DON'T DO IT. 2.0 has tapped all of us out big time, and this is a humongous project to take on immediately afterwards.

To add insult to injury, my hard drive's Master Boot Record went tits-up mysteriously Monday morning, so I've had no computer for the last 3 days. After 2 days of scanning and sitting on tech support lines all day, I found an $80 solution that seems to fit all my needs - R-Studio 2.0. So far I recovered 41 GB of data that has literally thousands of work hours put into it (dating back over 5 years, to my days of video game design) for a paltry sum. Check it out at http://www.r-tt.com.

But I've still lost a week on a project I'm already behind on. This is not a Good Thing. At least Scott will be coming up tomorrow for Sin City and 10kB jamming, and we'll see some progress in other mechanical sectors that I may be able to make up the 10k words I am now behind. Cross your fingers for me.

And before I forget:

:: how jedi are you? ::

Goobery

So I saw the new Star Wars Ep III trailer last night on national TV (thank god for fiancees who can stomach an hour of "The OC" to alert me to the trailer at the end). All I can say is: Oh. My. God. I'm not one of those weird guys who has a Mandalore tattoo or a fetish for Carrie Fisher in her Jabba's barge outfit (though she did look good...), but this movie looks farkin' incredible. The trailer literally gave me chills. The trailer laid out Anakin's descent and corruption, and the basics of the story, and if the film is remotely close to what was presented here, This Film Will Not Suck. Death, betrayal, lots of lightsaber fighting, lava, huge space battles and best of all, Darth Vader. Best line, by Obi-Wan - "You were supposed to be the chosen one!" in a betrayed, teary voice. Combined with the pics I downloaded from the website posted in Lord Zog's blog a few weeks back, and this movie is going to redeem the franchise.

As an added bonus, I finally saw the full Sin City trailer, with more of the actors, especially Mickey Rourke as Marv. Oh yeah. I cannot wait for this movie - I've been waiting for it for over 12 years now, and it's almost here.

10,000 Questions, Part III: Son of 10,000 Questions:
C'mon people, you are slacking off here!

The Thane continues his line of questioning:

"Is it a stand-alone product?"

Stand alone in that it is complete by itself? No, Spycraft 2.0 will be required to use the entirety of the book, though a vast majority of the book will be usable by the standard d20 player, and about half by the gamer from any system. It's a setting, so there's a lot of "fluff" material here.

Stand alone in that it is a one-off book? No to that either. If all goes well with our first release, Ten Thousand Bullets should be a line of books. But the first book should contain all elements of the genre in there, with future books expanding the setting and or adding layers of additional rules and information for specific subgenres. More on that later.

Oh, What Could Have Been
The Best Page in The Universe is hysterical for rants and raves about...stuff. Read up on videogames that never quite made it into production.

10,000 Questions, Vol. 2: The Revenge

More questions, more answers:

Mortadelo's up next:

"If Ten Thousand Bullets were a movie, what movie would be?"

Excellent question! Hmmm. I'd have to say it'd be Michael Mann's Heat, The Maltese Falcon, To Live and Die in LA, and a dash of the upcoming Sin City. At least, for starters.

And that ain't all. :)

McCalister followed up with:

"Is Ten Thousand Bullets a 'now' campaign or is it '10 minutes from now' in terms of when it's set? I hope that makes sense."

It makes perfect sense. The answer is...yes and no. It's going to equip you for the 'now' campaign in the main, but I already have plans for a much broader application than the here and now. Very cool stuff :)

10,000 Questions, Vol. 1

Dave McAlister, webmeister of Modus Operandi, wrote:
"Ah question time... OK. A while ago you posted the cover image and I spotted the tattoos. I don't think I managed to work out the significance (sp?) but I'm dying to know. Please put me out of my misery."

The significance of the tattoos is the man is a Yakuza :)

Mortadelo, the thane of Spain, wrote:

"Ok, first question.

Is this the Project X?"

Yes indeed, it is.

Wolverine, Kiwi superfan, wrote:

"How about, say a list of Class and/or PrC names [or just the good ol' 'XXXXXX' format and let people guess."

Let's do base classes for now:

XXuX
XXXeX
XiXXX
XXXXXn

Heh heh.

Iron Kingdoms World Guide

So the list of posts keeps growing...I got my comps for my (very small amount of) work on the Iron Kingdoms World Guide, the latest and greatest from Privateer Press. It's the first time *ever* that I've not only received my comps on time, but a ltd edition copy only for contributers, PLUS I got them a week before official release. Wh00t!

The book is very nicely bound - even at a massive 400 pages - just like it's predecessor and partner volume, the Iron Kingdoms Character Guide. Unlike its predecessor, however, the IKWG has not a scrap of rules. Instead, the book focuses exclusively on the land of Western Immoren, its political bodies, movers and shakers, and other events. "Dense" does not begin to describe the effort here - a herculean job on the part of Joe Martin, Matt Wilson, and all the Privateer Press RPG team. Every city on the map, every nation, is described in a pleasant balance of detail and gloss that should appeal to the DM, RPGer and WARMACHINE player alike.

For those of you who want to try FantasyCraft at some point, I would almost say this book has everything you need storywise - save for the all important theological information, which is an important aspect of the world itself. Still, gamers of all systems could get a valuable lesson in world construction and/or a downright compelling fantasy-steampunk world to play in all in one volume. I'm glad to have worked with this crew.

Ten Thousand Bullets Questions

So, in an effort to avoid shameless self-promotion on the forums, I want to field questions about Ten Thousand Bullets here in the blog. Just post questions, concerns or comments in the feedback and I'll do my best to tease the hell out of you. Fire away.

This One Needs No Comment

Take the quiz at dicepool.com

You are the large, round, friendly d20! (You probably didn't know this, but the shape of the twenty-sided die is called an Icosahedron.) You are the friendly, outgoing, outspoken, leader of friends. You are often looked up to, even though you don't normally deserve it. Most other types secretly wish they were you, and you'd give them tips on how, if only you had a clue yourself. Your charisma is often all you need, but you have your occasional moments of brilliance as well--just never when it's actually needed. You are the all-around good guy, a dependable chum, a respectable foe, and an inspiration to those who need one. Who says you can't get by on a smile and good looks alone?